Patran and MSC Fatigue Updated

By DE Editors

MSC Software (Santa Ana,CA) announced the 2012 releases of Patran pre-/post-processing software for finite element analysis (FEA) and MSC Fatigue, its FE-based durability and damage tolerance solver extension for Patran. The new release, scheduled to be available shortly, is said to provide engineers with improved modeling productivity, extended nonlinear and failure event simulations, and improved capabilities for predicting product fatigue life.

Patran 2012 from MSC Software.

Patran 2012 sees the debut of a new Model Browser Tree that, says MSC Software, can help users navigate through the menus efficiently as well as access and modify various aspects of their models. Reportedly intuitive and easy to use, the Model Browser Tree, which is available on Windows and Linux platforms, is customizable to the user’s process. The company says that the Model Browser Tree reduces learning curves, increases productivity, and makes Patran more intuitive to use because it enables database entities to be visualized, accessed, and manipulated easily.

New, improved, and upgraded features in Patran 2012, says the company, enable engineers to analyze more nonlinear events and study failure more accurately. Newly supported capabilities include cohesive zone modeling and virtual crack propagation for failure analysis, as well as enhanced support for contact that includes segment-to-segment contact detection, contact table enhancements, and new nonlinear elements.

Patran 2012’s cohesive zone modeling technique simulates delamination or crack growth. MSC Software says that it’s especially beneficial for composite structure failure analysis. Virtual Crack Closure Technique is described as simulating crack growth using a simple, but general way to evaluate the energy release rate of a crack. The segment-to-segment contact method implemented in Marc and MSC Nastran is now supported in Patran. This method is said to provide improved accuracy while overcoming the limitations of the master segment-slave node approach of the traditional node-to-segment contact method. This method is also said to be well-suited for both higher- and lower-order elements and provides smoother contact stresses.

Several new 1D, 2D, and 3D element formulations first implemented in MSC Nastran and Marc are now supported by Patran. Other contact enhancements incorporated into version 2012 include shell edge-to-edge, shell edge-to-solid face, and beam-to-solid face contacts with support for moment carrying glue, and improved contact table support for breaking glue, anisotropic friction and wear factor.

MSC Fatigue 2012.

MSC Fatigue is intended to enable durability engineers to predict how long products will last under any combination of time-dependent or frequency-dependent loading conditions. To estimate life-to-failure, MSC Fatigue uses stress or strain results from FE models produced by such application as MSC Nastran, Adams, and Marc as well as ABAQUS, ANSYS, LS-DYNA, and Pam-Crash; variations in loading; and cycling material properties.

With the new solver in MSC Fatigue 2012, many fatigue analysis types have been updated. Both the traditional Stress-Life (S-N or total life) and Strain-Life (E-N, local strain or Crack Initiation) methods are available. MSC Fatigue Shaker, new in version 2012, predicts the fatigue life of components subjected to a single input random vibration load. Additionally, analysis of spot welds using MSC Fatigue 2012 Spot Weld can help users build optimized designs and reduce prototyping and testing costs. MSC Fatigue 2012 also includes a new structural stress based Seam Weld module, as well as the traditional weld classification approach.

For more information on Patran 2012 and MSC Fatigue 2012, visit MSC Software.

Go to the Patran web page.

Go to the Fatigue web page.

Watch the Patran 2012 launch announcement.

Download a PDF of what’s new in Patran 2012.

Download the MSC Fatigue brochure.

See why DE’s editors selected 2012 releases of Patran and MSC Fatigue from MSC Software as their Pick of the Week.

Sources: Press materials received from the company and additional information gleaned from the company’s website.